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Tuesday, July 31, 2012

Often times, people talk about the responsibility of carrying a gun from the context of not doing something stupid with the gun and generally being safe. I want to talk about another aspect of that responsibility.

It seems to me that most of the professions generally regarded as having the highest level of responsibility are what I call the "life saving" professions. These are mostly in the medical field. People who's daily job revolves around improving the health of other people. While I have a very high regard for those in the medical profession, in my opinion it is fairly easy to make decisions with the sole purpose of saving or improving life, even knowing that a poor decision may cost someone their life.

As people that carrying firearms we may find ourselves in a similar situation, having to make decisions that directly impact the life of another. But this is the difference. Where doctors, nurses, EMTs, et al. are trusted to save life, we who carry guns either as a personal choice or professionally are trusted to take life. To me, that is a responsibility that far out weighs any other than I can think of. Let that sink in for a while, and make sure you are willing to carry that responsibility on your shoulders.

Monday, July 30, 2012

The "300" has become a standard drill that I use for measuring performance, and also to work on basic marksmanship. It serves as a data point for comparison as well. On June 29th I shot the 300 with my Glock 22. On July 26th I shot the same drill with the LC9 for the first time.

My highest score with the Glock 22 is a 244.

My highest score (and only score) with the LC9 is a 190.

I am still learning the LC9 trigger, so that is what I attribute the lower score to. Not a limitation of the gun, but a limitation of the shooter.

Sunday, July 29, 2012

One of the problems when carrying a concealed handgun is we often times are told we need to also carry a spare magazine, a tactical light, a knife and an assortment of other tactical "accessories". There just isn't enough room to carry all this stuff! Haus of Guns wrote a good blog post about this conundrum titled Carry Less, Carry More and makes a really good point about not overloading with gear.

In the past, I have always been one of those guys who pushed for carrying a full size or near full size pistol. A look at the list of pistols I have used as carry guns in the past is evidence of that belief, all but two have been full size pistols, and those two didn't stick around long. Having started shooting and carrying the Ruger LC9 I am rethinking my approach to concealed carry. My logic behind a full size pistol has always been better shooting performance and more bullets and all that is true, but at what cost? Is something easier to carry better than something that is easier to shoot?

I am still working on trying to get where I can use an over the top rack technique on pistol reloads in under 2 seconds. So far, it has been nothing but a barrel of FAIL. My last couple of range trips I have spent more time than normal specifically on reloads trying to better quantify where I am at now. On 6-29-12 I did 19 reloads on the clock and had an average time of 2.53 seconds. I really had some impressive times for this reload technique with a fastest of 2.13 seconds when everything went well. I had three other reload below the 2.20 mark. My slowest was an incredible 3.32 seconds where I really fumbled everything up. I only had one other reload over 3.00 seconds, another fumble. Here are the raw numbers.

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1st Shot

Reload

2nd Shot

1.79

2.98

4.77

1.47

2.59

4.06

1.62

2.50

4.12

1.50

2.44

3.94

1.44

2.17

3.61

1.40

2.18

3.58

1.36

2.38

3.74

1.39

2.16

3.55

1.46

2.64

4.10

1.36

3.32

5.08

1.31

2.31

3.69

1.36

2.63

3.99

1.35

2.14

3.49

1.32

2.13

3.45

1.28

2.69

3.97

1.28

2.29

3.57

1.28

2.49

3.77

1.60

3.20

4.80

1.58

2.88

4.46

Avg.

Avg.

Avg.

1.42

2.53

3.98

So if I nail the reload, I can get close to where I want to be (sub-2.0 seconds). The problem is, I am not consistently nailing the reload. I have always struggled with reload consistency on the Glock platform. I consistently have trouble getting the magazine and mag well lined up correctly and they get hung up on each other. This is one area where the Beretta excelled over the Glock, as mentioned in this post. I just really need a lot of work in this area (and every other area too!!!).

Wednesday, July 4, 2012

In my web searching for information about the LC9 one of the consistent complaints I see is the long and heavy trigger. I guess the people writing that don't have much time behind DAO guns because the LC9 trigger in my opinion does not fall into that category. The actual press is pretty smooth and light. It is longer than your typical striker fired gun, but it isn't near as long as a true DA trigger pull because the LC9 rest in a half-cock condition.

My issue with the Ruger trigger is the two click reset. So far, this actually has not been a problem under live fire conditions, just dry fire. So it could be a non-issue itself, but since no one seems to be talking about it I thought I would mention it. Here is a video to show what I am talking about.

For someone who has put a lot of trigger time in behind a Glock where it is generally taught to use the trigger reset, this causes havoc. For other people used to shooting other types of guns with less defined trigger resets, maybe not so much. ﻿

Tuesday, July 3, 2012

As part of the LC9 and G22 comparison the Kyle Defoor Pistol Tests are going to be used as one of my data points. I had the chance to shoot Pistol Test #1 with the G22 on the range the other day. I had to improvise in a couple areas because I do not have USPSA targets available to me just yet (which is why I only did test #1), nor do I have true NRA B8 replacements centers.

What I did use for this test was a printable B8 replacement center. So it ends up actually being significantly smaller than the replacement center and essentially does not include half of the 7 ring, and less of the 6 ring than an actual repair center. I also used a piece of notebook paper folded to half the vertical size of a standard USPSA target A-zone to represent the reduced A-zone, and an actual business card for the head A-zone.

String #1. Running from the target to the 25 yard line and firing 6 rounds at the B8 replacement center.
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String #1

﻿﻿﻿﻿﻿﻿﻿﻿﻿The hit off the paper at the 10 o'clock position would have been close on an actual B8 replacement center. If it was on, it would be a 6 and that would be give me 50 points exactly. If it were off, I would be down 6 and failed this part of the test. Having done it once, I think I could definitely improve on this part. My run to the 25 was a little lackadaisical, and probably cost me a lot of time. As you can see, I barely got the rounds off in the time limit. ﻿﻿﻿﻿﻿﻿﻿﻿

﻿﻿String #2. One round to the reduced A-zone in less than 2 seconds from 6 yards. ﻿

String #2

﻿This was fairly easy, and well within my performance envelope. ﻿

String #3. Six rounds to the reduced A-zone in less than 4.5 seconds from 6 yards.

String #3

﻿This was also fairly easy and well within my performance envelope.

String #4. Two rounds of the head A-zone (aka "credit card") of a standard USPSA target in 3.5 seconds.

This is at the edge of my shooting ability. My draw to a low probability target sucks, and a business card is a pretty small target.

I am pretty certain that on strings 1-3 I can make some fairly significant improvements to the times. String #4 is going to be a challenge, but I like challenges :)

Once I get some USPSA targets I will try the other two pistol tests as well.